


Fireside Tensions

by Zenith931



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-21
Updated: 2017-09-21
Packaged: 2019-01-03 19:45:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12153543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zenith931/pseuds/Zenith931
Summary: A moment of romantic tension between my Inquisitor and Cullen





	Fireside Tensions

The mountains had finally granted a reprieve for the members of the Inquisition. All of them were refugees from Haven and they finally had a night that didn’t include bitter winds, freezing cold, and desperate circumstances. The entire entourage had come together under Aren, following her lead through the mountains. She had no real idea where they were headed, except that Solas promised a refuge and no one else had stepped up to bring the people together. Solas had imprinted the necessity for the group to have a leader to survive and he apparently thought Aren Travelyan was the best option for this position. With his encouragement and seeing the lack of leadership from the usual faces, Aren had stepped up. She formed a group of scouts that she headed to find the best routes through the dangerous Frostback mountains. They had been making steady progress for several days, and had been finding suitable places for the congregation to camp for the night.

Currently, they were at one of these camping locations. The night was calm, and the sounds of fires and the cheerful talk of people clustered around them rose through the air. Aren wasn’t at one of those fires, though. She sat alone in front of her own tent, in front of her own small fire. Her hands were at her temples, and she rested her head upon them in exhaustion. The days of being a leader, of having so many lives reliant upon her was a massive weight upon her and she was trying to take what little energy she had left to shore up the cracks the responsibilities had upon her psyche. The longing for escape with alcohol shook her hands, but the rest of the troop needed whatever supplies they had for their own spirits and consumption. 

Aren had seen Solas meditating before as his own way of dealing with the tasks ahead of the Inquisition. The mysterious elf wasn’t very forthright in explaining his technique, much like he was equally mysterious in knowing there was a refuge for the survivors under her care. As hard as she tried, and as much as she could understand, meditation wasn’t working for her. 

The sound of footsteps in the snow broke her concentration on trying to calm herself and she looked up with a start. The commander paused behind her, shifting his weight uneasily. Aren looked at him blankly, trying to pull her usual mask of instant confidence and unflappability on. The pressure of responsibility and the shock of being jolted out of her thoughts hindered that ability. 

While she struggled to gain her composure, Cullen cleared his throat uncomfortably, “May I join you?” He motioned next to her at the fire. Aren shifted over in response and he sat down carefully, as if he was triple-thinking every move he made. He paused for a long moment, looking at the fire, as if it offered some source of encouragement or advice. Finally, he broke the silence, “You seem much better now.”

He was referring to when he and Cassandra located her delirious and hypothermic in the mountains immediately after Haven’s destruction. Aren hadn’t been conscious or remembered most of it, but by Varric’s accounts, she had been carried back to the camp, wrapped in Cullen’s cloak, and he had stayed at her side enough times that even Cassandra began to get suspicious. Since then, Aren had been working herself ragged and hadn’t had much of a chance to engage in anyone, much less the commander. 

Aren cracked a small, sly grin, “You mean since you gave me this?” She fingered the cloak around her shoulders. It wasn’t his trademark furry mantle, but another fur-lined, heavy cloak. His expression immediately reddened in a deep blush. She continued, her tone more somber, “I’m not frostbitten…” Her words trailed off and she debated mentioning the weight on her mind.

She needn’t have bothered in her debate since it seemed like he noticed anyway, “You have become a leader to everyone in the camp. I can see how everyone has been looking at you. I even had one of my scouts that you ‘acquired’ disregard my orders for yours.” He paused a bit and she wondered if he was upset at that last bit before he chuckled, half in embarrassment and half in humor, “But you lately have seemed preoccupied… stressed.”

Her efforts generally focused on hiding her emotions and how much the stress of her self-appointed position weighed on her, but despite her attempts, it seemed as if he could see through it all. One of her hands shook at the effort of keeping herself constrained and she pressed them on the bench she sat upon in an effort to keep them still. Cullen’s gloved hand reached out and he rested it upon her hand beside her. 

Her stress spiked at the touch and the anxiety caused her heart rate to increase. She narrowed her eyes as she was desperately trying to keep the weight of everything from crushing her. His touch seemed to be just another weight that she couldn’t control.

Cullen continued on, “I’m glad to see you’re not in physical danger any longer, but I worry about you still. Especially after Therinfal, and in your cabin…” 

He kept talking, but Aren couldn’t hear it, her ears only registered a dull, static roar. The mention of Therinfal and the trauma it imposed was more than her composure could handle and she felt like she was going to explode. She felt like she needed to act, to do something to lessen the stress upon her immediately. There was no alcohol present, she had no real option of unloading the weight of leadership, but she noticed that this ex-templar which haunted and vexed her was very near. She had flirted with him mercilessly in Haven and it had initially been a source of amusement for her. Over time, she wondered if she did it for her own amusement or for some other reason. She had no concept of how to handle whatever their relations to each other were, but she felt like she had to act on the only thing that felt right as a way of lessening the pressure. 

Cullen had been looking at her as he talked, he seemed uncomfortable and was blushing. She still only heard the dull roar of her own pulse in her ears, and she wondered what he was talking about. But she had toyed with enough men’s hearts to realize what the content of his statements were based on his body language. However, she wasn’t toying when she leaned towards him. Cullen was in mid-statement and immediately froze when Aren leaned closer. She was close enough to him to smell him; the scent of wood smoke, a few days of hard work, and leather pricked her nose. His lip trembled faintly and she could’ve swore she saw him begin to close the distance between them before the sound of someone clearing their throat broke the roaring in her ears. Cullen stood up immediately and she was left swooning as the sudden exposure to reality rushed back over her like a tsunami.

One of her scouts looked at her with a peculiar expression. Aren had seen this expression enough times in herself, in other bards, and nobles to realize the scout realized what they had just walked in on. The elven scout hid her expression, although her eyes betrayed her as she handed Aren a stack of papers. “Reports from the other scouts, Herald.”

Aren took the reports, numbly. The scout disappeared and she noticed that the commander had fled the scene during the interruption as well. She stood here looking blankly down at the stack of papers, wrestling with her emotions alone next to the fire.


End file.
